Iron-Baldy Traverse Attempt
Posted: Sun Jan 10, 2010 5:44 pm
Zach and I set out early Saturday to traverse the San Antonio ridge from Iron Mtn to Baldy. I woke up that morning with a low-grade fever and soon after picking up Zach at Manker Flats the nausea set in (nothing personal, Zach 
). Between stopping to hurl every so often and a very low energy level, I was lagging big-time, taking almost six hours to top out on Iron 
.
After hanging out on Iron for a while with Ze, Steve and Fernando, we started heading down the ridge for Baldy. The ridge was great fun, though easier that either of us had expected—just some mild class 3 in a few spots. Any snow was on the north side of the ridge and mostly avoidable. We had gotten just past Gun Sight Notch—where all the technical difficulties end—and it was nearly 2p. The ~2400 ft slope up to West Baldy was all snow and we figured with my current sickly pace we’d be doing part of it (a route neither of us had done) in darkness. His recent unplanned (read that, cold) bivy still fresh in his mind, Zach became the voice of reason and suggested we consider heading back the way we came. As much as I didn’t want to climb the 1K ft back up to Iron and then descend the long trail all the way back to the East Fork, I couldn’t argue with his logic. So after spending an hour reconnoitering a possible descent route via Coldwater Canyon (whole other TR
), and me throwing up a couple more times, we reversed course, arriving back at Heaton Flats by 7:30p.
In spite of being denied our goal, it was another stellar day in the mountains with great company
. Pix are here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/21042415@N ... 184534740/
). Between stopping to hurl every so often and a very low energy level, I was lagging big-time, taking almost six hours to top out on Iron .After hanging out on Iron for a while with Ze, Steve and Fernando, we started heading down the ridge for Baldy. The ridge was great fun, though easier that either of us had expected—just some mild class 3 in a few spots. Any snow was on the north side of the ridge and mostly avoidable. We had gotten just past Gun Sight Notch—where all the technical difficulties end—and it was nearly 2p. The ~2400 ft slope up to West Baldy was all snow and we figured with my current sickly pace we’d be doing part of it (a route neither of us had done) in darkness. His recent unplanned (read that, cold) bivy still fresh in his mind, Zach became the voice of reason and suggested we consider heading back the way we came. As much as I didn’t want to climb the 1K ft back up to Iron and then descend the long trail all the way back to the East Fork, I couldn’t argue with his logic. So after spending an hour reconnoitering a possible descent route via Coldwater Canyon (whole other TR
), and me throwing up a couple more times, we reversed course, arriving back at Heaton Flats by 7:30p.In spite of being denied our goal, it was another stellar day in the mountains with great company
. Pix are here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/21042415@N ... 184534740/
